Why I Encouraged My Adopted Son To Have A Relationship With His Birth Parents
It might not work for everyone, but it worked for them.
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What is it like to adopt a baby when the birth parents want to visit their child regularly? Would it affect your child’s relationship with you?
My older son is adopted. My ex-wife and I differed on the amount of contact with the birth parents for a long time. By age 15, she accepted my point of view and contact with the birth parents was established.
I always felt that it was imperative for my son to know his biological parents. He developed a very close bond with his birth dad. In no way have I ever felt the least bit threatened by this. I encouraged my son to call his birth father “Dad” — after all, it’s true. There’s all sorts of value that my son derived from the reconnection. And his birth father overcame adversity that he was facing at the time of the adoption.
Flickr / Artem Popov
I am fiercely proud of both of them. And I have elsewhere expressed my view of the love and courage demonstrated by his birth mother, who was the driving force in the adoption and hoped that I could offer what she knew she could not. Many years later, she has reassured me that she believes she chose well.
In no way has his relationship to his birth parents hurt our relationship. To the contrary, I think that this contact has resolved major issues for both of them, leaving more space for love, security, and connection.
I am sure that open adoption has a mixture of results. But as must be obvious, I think it worked well for my situation, and most importantly, I am very very sure it was right for my son.
Andrew Weill is a tax attorney who has written on a diverse myriad of topics, including politics, pop culture, and relationships. You can find more from Quora here:
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